Legal Theory Blog

Fred Zacharias

I am saddened to report the passing of my former colleague at the University of San Diego, Fred Zacharias.  Fred was a prominent, prolific, and intelligent scholar, specializing in legal ethics and professional responsibility.  Fred combined a keen intellect, a warm and generous personality, and a certain trademark dour outlook.  Fred was able to see the worst in every situation but always responded to the best in his colleagues and friends.  He will be sorely missed.

New Dean At Illinois

Here is the official announcement:

Bruce P. Smith, a noted legal historian and award-winning University of Illinois law professor, has been named Dean of the College of Law, pending approval by U. of I. trustees at their Jan. 15 meeting in Chicago.

 

Dean Smith, who joined the law faculty in 2001 and has served as associate dean for academic affairs since April, would become the college’s 12th dean and Guy Raymond Jones Faculty Scholar, effective Feb. 16.

 

He would replace Heidi Hurd, who was dean from 2002 to 2007, when she stepped down to join the faculty of the more than century-old college.

 

“Bruce is a scholar of considerable vision and energy with high ambitions for the college,” said Richard Herman, chancellor of the Urbana campus. “He is just the right person to be leading our fine College of Law.”

 

Dean Smith, 44, says his years on the U. of I. faculty will yield a smooth transition to heading the college, ranked 27th in the latest U.S. News ratings of the nation’s top 100 law schools.

 

“The College of Law has tremendous strengths: a world-class faculty, top-notch students, talented administrators and staff, and highly accomplished alumni,” Smith said. “It is a privilege to have the opportunity to lead such a remarkable institution and to advance the mission of this great public research university. I look forward to building on the significant legacy of my predecessors, helping the college achieve our ambitious goals, and visiting with many of our alumni in the coming months.”

 

Dean Smith, whose research has focused on Anglo-American criminal procedure in the 18th and 19th centuries, is co-director of the Legal History Program at the college, whose graduates include Illinois Supreme Court Justice Lloyd Karmeier and Michael Strautmanis, longtime legal counsel to President-elect Barack Obama.

 

He has written a book that will be published this year on the history of common law, along with numerous articles that have appeared in peer-reviewed journals and law reviews.

 

In 2008, Dean Smith was one of two recipients of the university’s prestigious Campus Award for Graduate and Professional Teaching, which recognizes excellence in the classroom, innovative approaches to teaching and other contributions to improved instruction, including influence on curriculum.

 

“I have been deeply impressed by the intensity and dedication of Professor Smith’s work as a scholar and teacher of law, and by the exciting vision he brings to the challenges of the law deanship,” said Provost Linda Katehi.

 

Before joining the U. of I., Smith practiced law for five years at Covington & Burling in Washington, D.C., working primarily in patent litigation, employment law and sports law, representing the National Football League, National Basketball Association and National Hockey League.

 

He received law and doctoral degrees from Yale University, where he was a Mellon Fellow in the Humanities and senior editor of the Yale Law Journal. He received a bachelor’s degree summa cum laude with highest honors in history from Williams College, and received bachelor’s and master’s degrees in history from the University of Cambridge, where he attended as a Hershel Smith Fellow.

Journal Announcemnt: Journal of Law Philosophy and Culture

The first two issues of the Journal of Law, Philosphy, and Cutlure are available online.  Follow this link!

Keenan on Norms & Globalization

Patrick Keenan (University of Illinois - College of Law) has posted Do Norms Still Matter? The Corrosive Effects of Globalization on the Vitality of Norms (Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law, Forthcoming) on SSRN.  Here is the abstract:

Why does the process of globalization undermine the power of social norms to regulate behavior? Norms are the social regularities that shape individual behavior and help to create vibrant, or dysfunctional, communities. Most theories of norms do not account for the many ways that globalization affects the foundations of norms. This article fills the gap by developing a more robust theory of the informal regulation of behavior that considers the ways that the process of globalization can interfere with the creation of norms and erode their power. I defend three primary claims. First, I argue that because individuals in a globalizing community typically suffer from significant disruptions in relationships, the community's ability to regulate itself is eroded. In vibrant communities, residents are willing to intervene in the lives of their neighbors by, for example, scolding children who misbehave in public or teenagers who deface buildings. But in a globalizing community, the conditions that give rise to this willingness to intervene are eroded by the process of globalization. Second, I argue that globalization can distort the process of creating and enforcing social norms by allowing individuals to, in effect, immunize themselves from the sanctions typically employed to enforce norms. For example, differences in social status affect the ways that observers judge illicit behavior, and the ways that they condemn, condone, or ignore that behavior. Third, I argue that globalization also makes it possible for individuals to engage in what I call reputational segmentation. In this process, people who wish to engage in an activity that carries social sanctions do so in a place where they are immune to the real effects of those sanctions. For example, a Western tourist who travels to the developing world to engage in illicit sexual activity, often with children, may suffer social sanctions in the destination community, but those sanctions do not follow him back to his country of origin. And because the quality of the person's life is affected almost entirely by his reputation in his country of origin, the ability to engage in reputational segmentation allows him to escape the consequences of his actions.

Weekend Update

On Saturday, the Download of the Week was Contractualism About Contract Law by Robin Kar & the Legal Theory Bookworm recommended Retained by the People: The "Silent" Ninth Amendment and the Constitutional Rights Americans Don't Know They Have by Dan Farber.  The Lexicon entry was an update version of Formalism and Instrumentalism.

Program Announcement: Summer Programs on the Constitution at George Washington

This summer the Institute for Constitutional Studies (George Washington University) will offer two programs on the Constitution: a workshop for college instructors and a research seminar for advanced graduate students and junior faculty. The application deadlines for both programs are rapidly approaching. Please share this reminder with your colleagues and students.

The WORKSHOP for college instructors -- "New Approaches to Teaching the Constitution" -- will be held in Albany, NY, from July 8 to 14, 2007. The workshop will be led by Professor Sandra F. VanBurkleo of Wayne State University with guest instructors from several academic disciplines (including Richard Hamm of the University at Albany, Paul Finkelman of Albany Law School, and Stephen Schechter of Russell Sage College). The workshop is designed for college faculty members who now teach or plan to teach undergraduate courses in constitutional studies. Participants will receive a $500 stipend, some travel expenses, and dormitory housing during the workshop. The application deadline is April 13.

The interdisciplinary RESEARCH SEMINAR will be held in Washington, DC, from June 11 to 17, 2007 (NOTE: these are revised dates). The topic is "Constitutionalism" and the seminar will be led by Aviam Soifer (dean of the University of Hawaii law school) and Mary Sarah Bilder (Boston College). The seminar is open to advanced graduate students and junior faculty members. International participants are especially invited to apply. Participants will receive free lodging, a travel allowance, and a modest per diem to cover food and additional expenses. Lodging will also be available from June 6 for participants who want to conduct additional research in the DC area. The application deadline is now April 22.

For more details about either of these programs, please visit the ICS website at http://www.law.gwu.edu/ics or contact the Institute at [email protected].

Journal Announcement: The New Criminal Law Review

The University of California Press has asked me to pass on the following announcement:

in January, April, July and October. "The New Criminal Law Review picks up where the Buffalo Criminal Law Review left off, by providing an international and interdisciplinary outlet for cutting-edge scholarship on issues related to criminal law and state punishment, featuring a mix of articles, essays, commentaries, and book reviews, along with symposium issues on topics of theoretical and practical importance." -Markus D. Dubber & Lindsay Farmer, Editors-in-Chief For more information on New Criminal Law Review, click here. Read the NCLR press release.

Sounds terrifice.  I wonder what their open-access policy will be.  Journals like this, especially new journals, will only succeed if they are committed to offering authors two things: (1) open-access full-text searching immediately upon publication (Google must have access to full text), and (2) open-access, free-of-charge downloadability in a reasonable period, i.e. within one year of publication.

Virginia Law Review Announces "In Brief"

The Virginia Law Review Association is proud to announce the launch of In Brief, the online magazine of the Virginia Law Review. As of today, January 22, 2007, In Brief can be found at www.virginialawreview.org. You can also sign up for email notification of when the next issue of In Brief is published. Our debut issue features a discussion of the virtues and vices of strong intellectual property protection in the world of fashion design and elsewhere. In the main essay, Where IP Isn't, Professors Kal Raustiala of the UCLA Law School and Chris Sprigman of the University of Virginia School of Law extend their recent Virginia Law Review Article, The Piracy Paradox: Innovation and Intellectual Property in Fashion Design, to consider the potential consequences and practical implications of stronger legal protection for fashion design. Professor Randal Picker of the University of Chicago responds by challenging one of Raustiala and Sprigman's underlying assumptions and pointing to a historical counter-example. Finally, Professor Rochelle Dreyfuss of the NYU School of Law considers the phenomenon identified by Raustiala and Sprigman at a higher level of generality in an attempt to draw lessons regarding the movement of an industry from a low-IP protection environment to one of greater protection. The purpose of In Brief is to create a forum that will meaningfully contribute to the legal academy's discourse. Because In Brief is available exclusively online, it has the flexibility to accommodate multiple formats and the speed to address timely debates. In order to facilitate these discussions, In Brief publications may respond to articles, essays, or book reviews published in the print edition of the Virginia Law Review, or they may explore new ideas unrelated to the Review's print content. Submissions for In Brief will be accepted from scholars, judges, and practitioners, as well as current law students. The In Brief format, while flexible, will require that all essays and responses be lightly footnoted and less than 3,000 words. We also prefer articles written in a more informal, news magazine opinion/editorial style. These guidelines will make the discourse more accessible to readers and will facilitate an expedited editing process, enabling In Brief to address issues of current interest in the most timely manner possible.

We encourage you to visit the Virginia Law Review website and read this first issue of In Brief. While you are there, sign up for the email service that will notify you when the next issue of In Brief is published. We are actively considering submissions for future publication in In Brief and we encourage you to consider submitting an essay or response.

Giving Thanks

Once again, I would like to take this opportunity to thank some of the many people who have made Legal Theory Blog and my other academic work possible.  This year, I would like to recognize my teachers and mentors in the philosophy department at UCLA--where I studied in the late 70s and early 80s.  I am especially grateful to:

• Robert Adams--for his Leibniz and for being a model of clarity and precision.
• Rogers Albritton--who taught me more about how to "do philosophy" than anyone else.
• Tyler Burge--for his course on Quine, which I have used in more ways that I could ever have imagined.
• Philippa Foot--who opened my eyes to Aristotle's ethics and much else.
• Jean Hampton--for introducing me to the philosophy of law and for her marvelous seminar on Rawls and Nozick, for my introduction to Kant, and most especially for hours and hours of generous conversation.
• Thomas Hill--for providing a map of normative theory that I use almost every day.
• Greg Kavka--whose course on utilitarianism became my model for truly great teaching and systematic thinking.
• Warren Quinn--whose deep intellect and commitment to "getting it right" provided a model that I struggle to emulate.

Rogers Albritton passed away after living a long and full life, but Jean Hampton, Greg Kavka, and Warren Quinn were taken before their time.  Only Tyler Burge is still at UCLA.  It was a very special place, and I am very grateful for having had the opportunity to spend some time there.

Journal Announcement: Northwestern Colloqouy

The Northwestern University Law Review has started a blog!  Here is the announcement:

Announcing the Northwestern Colloquy

http://northwestern-colloquy.typepad.com/

Welcome to the Northwestern Colloquy.  This first post provides an outline of the Colloquy, an exciting new feature of the Northwestern University Law Review.

The Northwestern Colloquy will be the first scholarly weblog to be operated by a major law review.  It will feature legal commentary written in the form of blog posts.  This new format will allow scholars to publish their thoughts within days of an emerging legal development.  The subject matter can be anything within the field of legal inquiry, whether a short exposition of a new idea, an analysis of an emerging legal topic, an ongoing debate regarding a legal issue, or a short response to an already published piece of scholarship.  Readers can rely upon the Law Review to ensure that citations in these pieces support the assertions made in the posts.  We will also be allowing comments on these pieces in a moderated forum.  We hope that this new feature will serve as both an attractive new way in which to publish ideas and as a meeting place for far-flung scholars to interact and refine their work.

Additionally, for those who wish to publish pieces that straddle the border between the depth and rigor of an article and the speed and brevity of a blog post or an op-ed, the Colloquy will regularly publish short pieces of scholarship, of no more than 5000 words and 40 footnotes.  These short pieces will be initially published on the web, and subsequently added to a print volume of the Law Review.  This will drastically shorten the amount of time that lapses between the conception of an idea and the possibility of its publication in a major law review from more than a year to less than three months.  Just as with the blog posts on the Colloquy, students will provide authors who contribute these short pieces with the editing and citation-checking services that are a hallmark of legal publication.

The Colloquy will launch, with both blog posts and its first short piece, on November 1, 2006. 

If you have questions about the Colloquy, or wish to submit a piece to be considered for publication either as a Colloquy blog-post or as a short piece which will be published in the Law Review as well as online, please e-mail Mark Spottswood, Colloquy Editor of the Law Review. Alternatively, please feel free to ask questions or offer suggestions in the comments. 

Welcome to the Northwestern Colloquy.  This first post provides an outline of the Colloquy, an exciting new feature of the Northwestern University Law Review.

The Northwestern Colloquy will be the first scholarly weblog to be operated by a major law review.  It will feature legal commentary written in the form of blog posts.  This new format will allow scholars to publish their thoughts within days of an emerging legal development.  The subject matter can be anything within the field of legal inquiry, whether a short exposition of a new idea, an analysis of an emerging legal topic, an ongoing debate regarding a legal issue, or a short response to an already published piece of scholarship.  Readers can rely upon the Law Review to ensure that citations in these pieces support the assertions made in the posts.  We will also be allowing comments on these pieces in a moderated forum.  We hope that this new feature will serve as both an attractive new way in which to publish ideas and as a meeting place for far-flung scholars to interact and refine their work.

Additionally, for those who wish to publish pieces that straddle the border between the depth and rigor of an article and the speed and brevity of a blog post or an op-ed, the Colloquy will regularly publish short pieces of scholarship, of no more than 5000 words and 40 footnotes.  These short pieces will be initially published on the web, and subsequently added to a print volume of the Law Review.  This will drastically shorten the amount of time that lapses between the conception of an idea and the possibility of its publication in a major law review from more than a year to less than three months.  Just as with the blog posts on the Colloquy, students will provide authors who contribute these short pieces with the editing and citation-checking services that are a hallmark of legal publication.

The Colloquy will launch, with both blog posts and its first short piece, on November 1, 2006. 

If you have questions about the Colloquy, or wish to submit a piece to be considered for publication either as a Colloquy blog-post or as a short piece which will be published in the Law Review as well as online, please e-mail Mark Spottswood, Colloquy Editor of the Law Review. Alternatively, please feel free to ask questions or offer suggestions in the comments.